Winchester planning: row deepens over recommendation to refuse EV hub

Officers have published a report arguing for the refusal of the proposed large electric vehicle charging station at Three Maids Hill.

The site already has planning agreed for a waste facility and is not classified as a greenfield. 

Adrian Keen, CEO of applicant InstaVolt, said: “This site is earmarked for a large waste facility. 

“A waste facility would be visually more harmful, much noisier and have giant, diesel guzzling lorries rattling through the countryside. What InstaVolt is offering is the opposite of that.”

READ MORE: Winchester planning: row over recommendation to refuse new EV hub

If Basingstoke-based InstaVolt’s application is approved it would see one of the biggest EV charging hubs in the country built, delivering much needed charging infrastructure to the area. 

Mr Keen added: “Our planning team at InstaVolt has taken the utmost care and consideration when submitting our plans. We have already made revisions to our lighting strategy, and we have provided a Biodiversity Net Gain assessment, which compares baseline conditions to post-development plans. Ours showed a score of 15 per cent, proving that this proposal will make the existing field more biodiverse. From the start we’ve wanted to work alongside officers.

“At InstaVolt we care deeply about ensuring our hubs are well placed and that we benefit the local community —not just in terms of EV charging infrastructure but by bringing jobs to the local economy and improving the ecology of the site.”

The main vehicle charging station would have 33 car charging bays, including drive-through charging bays for large/towing vehicles, and accessible charging bays. As well as an on-site restaurant.

Mr Keen said: “We understand that our application is innovative, so it doesn’t fit within the policies of a decade’s old local plan. But the government has made it clear that low carbon EV projects like this need to go through planning more quickly. We’re offering the site to be used in a way that aligns with the council’s green agenda, and we don’t want to be immediately discounted.

“To say there is no operational need for this rapid charging hub is saying that EV drivers do not need to charge their vehicles while on the road and away from their homes. We need common sense to prevail here."

In the planning officers' report, it said: “The development would result in a significant new element of built development in the open countryside and the scale, design and layout of the proposal would not have regard to its rural context, thereby resulting in harm to the countryside and immediate locality. 

“Developing charging infrastructure to meet climate objectives should not form part of a justification for inappropriately located or designed development and, having regard to the harmful impacts identified it is therefore recommended that planning permission should be refused.”

The plans will go before the planning committee on Tuesday, December 12.